Westcare Customer Story | Alcion | Alcion

CUSTOMER SPOTLIGHT

Industry: Nonprofit

ABOUT WESTCARE

The Westcare Group has been supporting people with disability since its original inception in 1947. Over the last eight decades Westcare has evolved to become a leading Australian Disability Enterprise (also recognized as a Social Enterprise) providing quality employment, training, and development in addition to accommodation services.

Westcare Incorporated (‘Westcare’), a community-focused not-for-profit, adopted Alcion as a part of a digital transformation initiative. Being in the business of supporting people’s lives, Westcare needed to ensure that personal and private data stored in their Microsoft 365 applications adhered to security standards and met compliance requirements. A key part of this effort to modernize their IT infrastructure therefore included the protection of their data against cyberthreats such as ransomware and malware.

minutes to onboard

TCO

lower cost of ownership

operational overhead

Impact

AI-Driven Ransomware Security: AI-driven ransomware protection and malware detection continues to provide peace of mind.
Lower Total Cost of Ownership: Met TCO goals with fully SaaS delivered service, by eliminating infrastructure costs and with per-protected user pricing.
“No Complexity Whatsoever”: Onboarded the platform within 10 minutes and simplified day-to-day operations.

For Dale Wright, General Manager ICT and Digital Transformation at Westcare, it was important to find a secure and easy-to-use data protection platform that would help meet business goals. Dale found Alcion to be the best fit given its AI-driven security features, simplicity of management, and flexible licensing.

“Alcion does what it says on the tin, allowing me to sleep better at night! With Alcion’s AI-driven security and simplicity of use, I can rest assured that my Microsoft 365 data is secure and is recoverable. The simple and flexible licensing model has helped us keep costs predictable and meet TCO goals.”

DALE WRIGHT

General Manager ICT and Digital Transformation, Westcare

The Challenge

As Westcare embarked on their IT modernization initiative, protecting their Microsoft 365 data with a reliable and secure service was a key requirement. With limited IT resources that were stretched thin, Dale needed a backup and security service that would be easy to deploy and simplify his day-to-day work, while offering robust backup and restore capabilities. Ransomware and malware security was a top-of-mind challenge to address, alongside strict compliance, and data sovereignty requirements.

Having used legacy backup software in the past, Dale had found operational pain to be high and costs hard to predict as data grew over time. For Westcare, it was important to keep the total cost of ownership low and predictable.

“Given that Westcare has responsibility to protect data from some of Western Australia’s pre-eminent Government Agencies as well as our own clients and staff it was critical that we partner with an industry-leading data protection organization that utilized cost-effective, cutting-edge AI driven detection and protection measures and for Westcare Alcion was the natural choice.”

ROB WILTON

Chief Executive Officer, Westcare Group

Modern, AI-Driven Data Protection With Alcion

Alcion’s intuitive, modern data protection as-a-service platform helped Dale onboard Westcare in under 10 minutes without any complications. The intelligent backup operations, robust backup workflows and automated notifications allow him to simplify day-to-day tasks so he can spend more time on strategic tasks to accelerate Westcare’s digital transformation initiatives. “It takes a big weight off my shoulders knowing that our Microsoft 365 data is secure and is recoverable with Alcion,” said Dale Wright.

Security and compliance were an important consideration for the Westcare team. Industry-leading ransomware detection from Alcion helps them use the power of AI to detect attacks early and with greater granularity. Safe backups that eliminate malware ensure safe restores.

Their entire Microsoft 365 environment is protected using Alcion today. The Westcare team has been able to meet their TCO goals, thanks to Alcion’s per-protected-user licensing, low operational overhead, and not requiring any infrastructure to run Alcion.

Key Benefits

Easy, Intelligent Management

Alcion is built for the IT generalist and does the heavy lifting with simplified AI-driven operations. Westcare onboarded in minutes and simplified backup and restore operations with Alcion’s modern, easy-to-use UI. Email notifications for security incidents and daily activity further improved observability.

Ransomware and Malware Protection

Ransomware security and malware protection was an important requirement for Westcare. Alcion’s AI-driven ransomware protection employs continuous learning for early, granular detection using per-user and per-site AI models. Malware removal from backups prevents reinfections and ensures backed-up data is safe.

No Operational Overhead

With no infrastructure or agents to manage, Westcare was able to minimize operational pain. Alcion takes care of all operational issues including successfully and transparently redriving backup failures in case of transient outages or upstream throttling of Microsoft APIs.

Flexible, Simplified Licensing

Alcion’s flexible per-protected-user licensing, and unlimited storage, with the ability to add monthly users helped Westcare meet TCO goals, even with an expanding user footprint. This flexibility, combined with no additional costs for SharePoint, Teams, and shared mailboxes and no infrastructure costs further helped with cost predictability.